Roof pitch and knee wall height when desiring a flat roof dormer

I have already read somewhere about the zigzag wall. Is it worth looking for it?

The forum search function will do the search for you, but the term does not lead to the hiding place of the Amber Room, only to the house of (like most hits for "piano"). The zigzag wall is a small enhancement for the otherwise unspectacular floor plan.

How do you then determine the approximate living area that the budget allows,

Currently not at all – the reasons for price increases are interchangeable, after bark beetle / corona / Putin, new ones will be found again if accidentally one has been survived. I actually meant more not to try to fully exhaust the budget. You don’t suddenly need more house just because the daily rate per square meter might once be lower than expected. Smart building families gladly accept the "risk" of, at worst, having money "left over".

if the architects are so often off target anyway

That is primarily and significantly the case with the "artists" (who mostly only offer "performance phase 1 to 4"). Practitioners "know what butter costs in Hamburg." However, most money is squandered by undisciplined builders (and those who "save" on the tender).

The difference between the calculation of a general contractor (GU) and that of an architect is that the GU has to deliver for the agreed price. In this respect, the price is rather not the problem, but more the construction description.

Thanks for the important tip! I'll remember that.

And thanks for your house photo. That helps me a lot.

Honestly, I don’t understand the whole thread! The way you write, this thread or your question only arises because the general contractor wants to convince you to build a two-story house because it is “allowed.” But what you actually want is something different. Now you are looking here for arguments that the contractor is right with his opinion and bias or attitude. Just because many want to build city villas or, according to @11ants's tone, replacement villas, it has not yet become a societal obligation, nor have houses with knee walls lost any of their attractiveness. On the contrary: if the floor area ratio allows it, people build with knee walls so that a nice attic can be created in the roof. The gables offer opportunities for window placement. Knee walls and roof pitch create cozy rooms and more comfort than blunt bedrooms without sloping roofs and rather simple interior design. The roofs are more resistant to storms. So if the demand and taste are there, one is allowed to build that way. I would not let a general contractor talk me into such essential questions. Nor any forum members you don’t even know. The contractor (and all other enthusiasts) can build their two-story house. Because it’s easier for the mason: he only has to build straightforwardly upwards, while a gable is somewhat more complicated to calculate.

Now the question arises about the optimal story height and roof pitch.

If you like the house in the photo, just use it as a reference?! If you need slightly less space upstairs, you could go down to about 120 cm because the area under 2 meters of standing height doesn’t not exist but can also be used and lived in. However, at 135 cm there is no problem with bedsitting under the sloping roof. From 150/160 cm in my opinion the exterior wall appears so massive again that you want to set a limit somewhere here if you don’t favor two stories.

If it is purely about room sizes, we would ideally need 90 sqm on the ground floor and just under 75 sqm upstairs.

I’ve already read somewhere about the zigzag wall. Is it worth looking for it? :)

No. It is worth having your contractor’s design discussed here for you in order to find bottlenecks and possibly plan a niche instead of a zigzag wall, whether for a cloakroom or the piano – whatever ;)

The thread simply arises from uncertainties on my part as a construction novice. I am not looking for confirmation that the general contractor is right. On the contrary, I am rather looking for confirmation that, as a layperson, I am not completely wrong if I don’t want to build the way the general contractor recommends. One sometimes thinks they want to / have to / should listen to the experiences of others. Personally, I just wanted a little help from an environment that doesn’t profit from me but is still considerably more knowledgeable than I am. ;-) And with this, I have at least received that, along with a few other useful pieces of information that are already obvious to you but unfortunately not yet to me.

At the right time, I will gladly have the floor plan taken apart as well. But that time has not come yet. :)

As you write, this thread or your question only arises because the general contractor wants to persuade you to build a two-story house, because it is "allowed."

That a full upper floor is certainly possible here (and even a straight-wall upper floor under feasible conditions) is a pleasant framework condition. Given the expected room program, these are also thankfully well fitting. And even a decision "in favor of the city villa house type" does not force it to be designed as an "Anstattvilla" (symmetry hell with smoky eyes next to an XXL double garage with wide-mouthed woodgrain gate in 7016) :)

If (are you actually a PTA, or how does one come up with such a forum name?) reads up on the consequence of the knee wall as a window divider, I am glad about that, and hopefully it will also be useful.

The general contractor has his own interests and should therefore always be only a contractor, and not also a planning advisor (but can still have worth considering building proposals in his repertoire). Basically, he only wants one thing: to get the contract, and in doing so, to draw a decent margin from the banal fact "that he thinks in cubic meters, and the customer thinks in square meters."

We last calculated with about €3000/m2 (Leipzig metropolitan area) and thus come to about 165-170 sqm.

Hello neighbor. Greetings from the south - Leipzig region. :cool: